1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an image creating apparatus for creating an image in accordance with preselected classifications upon entry of data, and more particularly to an improved apparatus suitable for creating an image relating to a face of a person.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
A portrait is conventionally used in in mass media such as newspapers, magazines and so forth, computers such as displays documents in word processors.
Drawing a portrait precisely expressing features of a face of a person is difficult because the drawer is required to have a good observation power of extracting a character of the face and a good representation power for exaggerating and reproducing the character. Accordingly, there is expected the development of an apparatus for automatically creating a portrait upon entry of an optional image.
There has been proposed heretofore a technique for extracting character quantities of face components such as eyes, a nose, a mouth, eyebrows and ears in the entered image of a face, and choosing or deforming face components previously stored based on the extracted character quantities to be arranged to make a portrait. This technique may be applied to creation of an image which is composed of a single or a plurality of image components other than portraits.
In this technique for automatically making an image such as a portrait, a single form is employed to chose or deform an image component based on a character quantity of an image component extracted from an entered image, so that portraits cannot be made in plural different kinds of forms based on an entered single face image which are different styles or facial cannot be made about the same person.
It is, therefore, a primary object of this invention to provide an improved image creating apparatus in which image component data is selected by a character quantity of an image component extracted from entered single image data and a selected-and-entered class to create an image, so that plural kinds of images having different styles and expressions may be created based on the entered single image data.
It is another object of this invention to provide an improved image creating apparatus which extracts a character quantity of a plurality of face components including color of at least one component from entered color face image data and corrects a standard color of at least one face component image to create a portrait with bright color based on the entered color face image data.
It is still another object of this invention to provide an improved image creating apparatus which may express a composite image in three dimensions without increasing the number of images, whereby reproduction of portraits created based on the entered face image data is improved.
According to a first aspect of this invention, there is provided an image creating apparatus which includes an image input device for receiving input of image data, a storage advice storing a plurality of image component data each having a different character quantity in each of a plurality of image character quantity, a class select device for receiving a selection-input for one of the plurality of image classes, and a control device for selecting image component data from the storage device based on a character quantity of an image component extracted from the image data received by the image input device and the image class selected by the class select device to create an image. The image component data includes a select rule of image component data. The image data input device includes an image pickup device for taking an image. The storage device stores component data about a face so as to create a portrait based on face image data entered by the image input device. The plurality of image classes are classified by types, expressions, ages and sexes.
In this image creating apparatus, an image or a portrait based on entered image data or face image data is created by image component data corresponding to a selected image class, so that plural kinds of images or portraits having different styles and expressions may be created based on the entered single image data or face image data. The image component is selected by the select rule so that it may be finely selected according to each image class.
According to a second aspect of this invention, there is provided an image creating apparatus according to the first aspect of this invention wherein the control device creates a plurality of image and which includes an image display device for displaying the plurality of images created by the image display device, and an output device for producing an image selected by the image select device.
This apparatus displays a plurality of images based on the plurality of image classes having different trends in character quantities of a singe image data and selectively generates one of the displayed plural images. Accordingly, after confirming an image creating status for the plurality of images having different classes, an operator may selectively generate his or her favorite image from the plurality of
According to a third aspect of this invention there is provided an image creating apparatus according to the second aspect of this invention in which the control device creates a first image and a single or a plurality of second images by selecting image component data from the storage device based on the character quantity of the image component extracted from the image data entered by the image data, an image class selected by the class select device and a single or a plurality of image classes not selected by the class select device, the image display device displays the second imaqes in a standby process in each of the devices or in a process of the first image, and the image select device receives a selection whether or not the second images are produced.
This apparatus creates an image based on the selected image class and an image based on non-selected image class to be displayed in the standby process or in the process of an image according to the selected image class for selective output. The image based on non-selected image class is also selectively outputted to improve its operation efficiency.
According to a fourth aspect of this invention, there is provided an image creating apparatus according to the first aspect of this invention in which the input device receives color image data, the storage device stores component image data of a plurality of components including standard color data of at least one image component, and the control device extracts a character quantity of a plurality of components including color of the at least one component from color image data entered by the image input device, reads out component image data from the storage device based on the extracted character quantity, and corrects a standard color of a corresponding component based on the extracted color to create an image. The control device extracts colors of a plurality of portions in at least one component of the entered color image data, and decides whether or not other component is selected as a result of comparison among the colors of the plurality of portions. For instance, when a center of a cheek different from normal is added into a cheek of the portrait.
This image creating apparatus extracts a character quantity of a plurality of face components including color of at least one component from entered color face image data and corrects a standard color of at least one face component image so that a portrait with bright color may be created based on the entered color face image data.
According to a fifth aspect of this invention, there is provided an image creating apparatus which includes a storage device for storing images of a plurality of components included in a single composite image with distance data from a view point to the respective images, images of a plurality of small components which are divided about one or all of the components according to a distance from the view point with distance data from a view point to the respective images for each component, and an image composite device for executing an process for each pixel to select an image having the shortest distance from the view point in the images of a plurality of components or small components extracted from the storage device. The view point represents a view point of a person who watches the portrait. An image of a component placed in an area in a distance direction from the view point to the images of other component other small component in the plurality of components is divided into images of a plurality component or the other small components. The composite image and an image of hair is divided into images of small components placed in front and back of the face image.
This image creating apparatus can express a composite image in three dimensions without increasing the number of images, whereby reproduction of portraits created based on the entered face image data is ensured.